Monday, 18 April 2016

Hi! I've been in a bit of a reading slump lately, and haven't been reading very often. I find that when I read before I go to bed each night, I zip through books but recently... um... Netflix. Anyway, so I didn't feel like I read enough to bother making a wrap-up for February alone - I think it was something like just one book, yikes - so I'm combining the past two months.

The first book I have is The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey. I read this book after I saw the movie, and I really enjoyed both. I think, despite negative reviews, they actually did quite a good job of adapting this to the big screen. My opinions will probably be different to someone who read this before watching the movie, but overall I think the adaption was really good. However, this isn't a movie review, oops haha. The book was enjoyable, the characters were likeable and there's romance, if you're into that.

The next book is Lady Midnight by Cassandra Clare.While some parts of this book struck me as similar to The Mortal Instruments series (such as the emotionally stunted blondes and the Malcom Fade/Magnus Bane characters) it was a quick, easy and exciting read. There was one scene on the beach with Emma and Julian - you'll know theone - where I was a little bit lost afterwards and didn't quite understand what happened until Julian brought it up. I don't know if that was because I was being a bit slow or if it was unclear to others as well. (by the way, if you want an uncut version of that scene, Cassandra posted it on her tumblr which you can find at: http://cassandraclare.tumblr.com/post/141990964319/as-promised-cassandra-jeans-emma-and-jules-from, which is much more obvious.) In the beginning I found it difficult to keep up with who was which character, there being so many siblings, but I quickly got over that. I loved the moments in this book where characters from previous series' made appearances - I think that will be a big attention grabber for other fans of her work, there was even a short story about the characters from The Mortal Instruments in the back of this book. I also really enjoyed the dark side of Julian that we caught a glimpse of and I am looking forward to seeing what Cassandra Clare does with that. Now the only problem is having to wait a year for the next book! I'll definitely need to refresh my mind on what happened haha.

Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick was the third and final book I read during these two months. The reason I chose to read this book was because I desperately needed to get over my book hangover from reading Lady Midnight and one of my friends has been telling me to read it for years. This was an incredibly quick read, I read it in about a day or two, and it kind of reminded me of a slightly higher quality fan-fiction, but I can't say it wasn't fun to read.

Wednesday, 13 April 2016

Over the weekend, myself and some family took a little trip to Bright. I had heard from a friend that in Autumn, the trees all turned a wonderful orange, which is something you don't come across much in Australia. Or, at least, in Melbourne you don't. And given that I'm more than slightly obsessed with American Autumns - which include many an orange leaf - I absolutely wanted to check out this Autumn-Wonderland-Town.
Upon arrival, I was only a tiny bit disappointed to find that it wasn't quite the orange wonderland I had expected, we had come too early. Nevertheless, the trees were beginning to turn, some had already turned completely, and the town was still very picturesque.
Once we had checked out the cottage we were staying in, which had a very aesthetically pleasing bathroom mind you, we went for a drive through the streets and up to Huggin's Lookout.

This was easily among some of the best views I've seen, in my 18 short years, and I can't say that the camera shots do it justice.

After Huggins Lookout, we drove down to the Arboretum (a memorial park, I think) and while this was not exactly filled with colour, as we had been told, it certainly contained some beautiful views and I managed to get some good shots of Rodney.

On our way back to the cottage, we detoured down a long road scouting for some Autumnal magic, and though we didn't find quite what we were looking for, it was a nice drive anyway.

Later that afternoon, we went for a stroll around the park near our accommodation and then retired for the day.

One thing I do wish I had brought with me, was some DVD's or my laptop. I found that I didn't have much to do when we weren't out exploring and I read nearly an entire book in the two days that we were there. (City of Ashes, if you were wondering).

The next day wasn't as eventful, but I managed to get some photos in the morning when we went down 'Cherry Walk'.

The rest of the day was spent driving around the mountains, through most of which I managed to sleep. It wasn't exactly my cup of tea, but it made Rodney happy which was good.